KNOX
Patience was my weapon, and Celeste was a war I intended to win.
I’d told myself a hundred times that what I was doing wasn’t seduction but strategy. I’d always been a strategist in business, war, and even in love. If she trusted me, she’d finally stop looking like she was waiting to be betrayed again. I needed her to believe that I wasn’t the kind of Alpha who took what wasn’t freely given or the monster everyone said I was. But every day around her made that lie harder to hold on to.
If I moved too fast, she’d shut me out completely. If I pushed too hard, she’d run. Every day was a new exercise in restraint; she haunted my dreams every night, and yet I guided her with the lightest teasing touches. My gaze would find hers across the dinner table and hold just a little too long, un
